michelle ward

Time for Tea

The July/August issue of Somerset Studio is on shelves at your local bookstore now!  In my column I show some of the Tea Books I've been making.  It was 2001 when I made my first one, and have made several over the years - enough to fill a tea caddy.  In May we had out all the tea fixings for an early morning viewing of the Royal Wedding....including scones with clotted cream and jam.  I think I need to make a mini book for all the weddings I've risen early to watch.  Back in April my two sister-in-laws treated me to a fun cream tea in England, so I made a little book about that event.  There's always a good reason to make tea, and there's always a good excuse to make a sweet little tea book.  Here's a sneak peek at the article:

Some images that got mentioned in the text didn't show up in the published piece - like the tea caddy I found to hold my collection of books.  I scored this one at the Container Store - perfect fit!  

And I mentioned in the article that the tea party book was shown in a cup I inherited from my Grandma Campbell.  Here it is.

I love coffee every morning, but for special occasions we break out the tea.  These little books are the size of a tea packet, and some have a string and tag like a tea bag.  It's a nice departure to work on a small scale, and it's such an addictive process.  Great for a gift, and a fun format for an invitation.

P.S.  I spy my own work on pages 56 + 57 too as artist Edan Ruthan Miller makes a ring bound journal to remind her of ideas....clippings from one of my articles (HERE, May/June 2012) appear on her pages. 

 

Summer catch-up

I can't believe it's officially summer!  I guess I've been on a little blog vacation.  I meant to chime in on my birthday, to show you the first blossom, definitely a sign from Shannon who would have been 50 on our special day.  By the following week in May the garden was in full bloom.  I also meant to post photos of our Fallon, who graduated from Rutgers.  So I will do that now.

Here are two of the four walls of roses.  The last photo shows how tall they've become - wanting to show off to the neighborhood.

And here's our girl graduating on Mother's Day from Rutgers University with honors.  As we looked back at photos of my college graduation we noticed that both Fallon and I wore a black dress with white polka dots.  Love that one of her baby photos has her dressed in red scarlet.

  

Here's a wonderful story of Synchronicity.  Ten years ago I posted this story: HERE. If you don't click through to read I'll summarize.  I was in a Self-Portrait round robin journal project and I was working on a page where I had typed up tiny strips of repeated words that described me.  Mother, Wife, Sister, Daughter, Friend, Artist....you get it.  So I had Fallon read them and tell me if I was missing anything.  She said: Believer.  So Believer became significant between us.  Every year since then I have gotten her a gift with Believer as an engraving or marking.  I have a wood sign in my studio that says Believe, so I found an R to add to it.  For some reason I painted it red.  See photo.  That was 2008.  Then a few years ago, when Fallon was deciding where to finish college, we were having a family discussion at the dinner table, reviewing the options.  She happens to look up from her placet at the table, and saw I had moved the Believer sign + R to a spot in the studio within view....and it was a "sign".  Literally.  Rutgers logo is a red R.  So she accepted Rutgers, and has graduated as a Scarlet Knight.

 

I've had a fun time working on a project for the last two weeks - something totally new for me.  There was a bit of a learning curve but that is what happens when you try to educate yourself on the properties of a material.  You'll see more about it in September. Meanwhile, here's some of my worktable:

 

So that's a quick catch-up from May....had some issues uploading photos but it appears to be working now so I will have another post going up later today.